How Tinted is Your View?

​As I was driving I starting noticing how the environment looked a little different with my sunglasses on. The sky was darker, the desert surrounding me was somewhat muted. Everything was tinted by the glasses I wore. I started thinking about how some glasses we wear are darker than others so the sun might be tempered by that. The blue sky might be shaded down somewhat, the green trees, the desert blooms. Some glasses are dark, some are lighter, some more brown, some with a blue tint, some are colorful with rose or rainbow colors. Whatever it is that we see as we go through our day is filtered through the glasses we wear.
 
I started noticing that this is similar to how we see things as we journey through our life. As we walk through life, our eyes or ‘glasses’ can get darker or dirty through sin, hurt, disappointments and brokenness. That distorts all that surrounds us. We all are seeing creation in a distorted fashion. It has become tinted in a way that was never meant to be. Matthew 6:22-23NIV says “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”
 
Our hearts desire is to get to the place where our glasses are clear and we no longer are looking at things around us through any kind of a tint. We finally see what God created. We see what God sees.
 
That is true in each other as well. We need to get to a place where we see in others what God created in them and what He sees in them. However, before we can ever do that we must first get to that place in ourselves. We must come to the place where we see what God created in us; we see the image of God in ourselves. This means the more we see the image of God in us, the more others will notice that as well. When that happens, we pretty naturally start noticing more Christ-likeness in others. We start to see the image of God. I think partly because that is what we are looking for, but partly too, because that is what we are filled with.
 
Through Spiritual Direction, we are able to go deep and begin to remove the layers of sin, hurt, disappointments and brokenness. We work with God and He begins to remove the layers of scales that have been tinting our view. With each layer that is removed, we are able to see more clearly the works of Jesus, the life of Jesus. In ourselves and in others.